Donald Trumpreportedly “erupted in anger” aboard Air Force One last week when he learned that the Justice Department had cautioned against releasing a congressional memo detailing alleged abuses by the F.B.I., convinced that the letter was part of a Deep State plot against him. A certain degree of paranoia is, of course, nothing new for an administration under siege from all quarters. Whether the memo will actually vindicate the president is another matter. In recent weeks, conspiratorial thinking has overtaken parts of the G.O.P., which has whipped itself into a frenzy over unreleased allegations by Rep. Devin Nunes of a plot against the president. Now that House Republicans have voted to make the memo public, Trump’s spin machine will face the ultimate test: whether a partisan document, designed to cast the F.B.I. in the worst possible light, will actually live up to the hype.

At this point, anything short of the Pentagon Papers or Operation Valkyrie would be a letdown. Sean Hannitytold his prime-time Fox News audience that the document, which allegedly exposes wrongdoing by F.B.I. and D.O.J. officials in the decision to surveil former Trump foreign-policy adviser Carter Page, would expose “the biggest political scandal in American history,” and that it will “shock the conscience” of Americans everywhere. “We’re talking about potential crimes. We’re talking about people being charged, going to jail,” he added. “It’s a scary night.” Hannity’s fellow pundits piled on, with Tucker Carlson declaring that the allegations in the memo—which he has not seen—are “more troubling than the underlying crime in Watergate” and Sebastian Gorka calling it “100 times bigger” than the abuses of power that led to the Revolutionary War. “This is our government spying on political adversaries,” he said. “This is federal law-enforcement officials obstructing justice.”

Monday’s vote triggered a five-day window during which Trump will either reject the memo’s release or approve it, but signs point to the latter. Last Wednesday, Chief of Staff John Kellyreportedly informed Attorney General Jeff Sessions that the White House supports the memo’s release, and Trump has reportedly already made up his mind to publish. As sources told Axios, Trump “believes [the memo’s contents] will solidify in the public’s mind that there’s a Deep State out to get him,” and sees its release as “vindication, despite Justice Department resistance.”

In addition to approving the memo’s publication, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee voted late Monday to forgo a briefing from F.B.I. Director Christopher Wray on the memo’s underlying sourcing, and blocked the public release of a competing report compiled by the Democrats, which has been described as a point-by-point rebuttal of the Nunes document. The panel did, however, vote to allow other House lawmakers to view the Democratic report. Democrats, who view the memo as a partisan effort to undercut the bureau’s Russia probe, expressed dismay at the ruling. “We have crossed a deeply regrettable line on this committee,” Adam Schiff, the committee’s top-ranking Democrat, told reporters after the vote. “We had votes today to politicize the intelligence process, to prohibit the F.B.I. and the Department of Justice from expressing their concerns to our committee and to the House, and to selectively release to the public the majority’s distorted memo.”

But the G.O.P.’s own stratospheric buildup could backfire. “They have so hyped this . . . that they’ve led their echo chamber into thinking that this is something extraordinary,” Schiff told Axios. “It’s incredibly misleading. I don’t think it in any way impugns the Russia investigation, or provides any basis for firing any of the personnel involved.” If the memo’s contents disappoint, Trump’s allies will be tasked with transforming feeble evidence into a convincing case—a task at which they have proven adept in the past. The president fights wars on perception, not fact, and the decision by F.B.I. Deputy Director Andrew McCabe— who has emerged as a symbol of the Deep State among Trump voters—arguably buttressed the idea that the F.B.I. is chock-full of James Comey and Hillary Clinton lackeys. To win the war, perhaps all Trump needs is to tangentially confirm his base’s view that the F.B.I. and the D.O.J. are his enemies, and the Mueller investigation is too steeped in political bias to produce any legitimate findings.